Menu

About

Welcome to my personal blog!

I use this site to share my ideas and opinions with you about the tourism business environment. I encourage you to engage with me by posting your questions or comments to any of my posts for an open dialogue. I look forward to connecting with you.

Cheers,

Hugh Riley

*********************************************************************

More Information: As the chief executive officer, Mr Riley oversees the CTO’s offices in Barbados, North America, the UK and Europe and leads the organization’s initiatives to strengthen relations with the tourism industry’s key strategic partners; these include hotels, airlines, cruise lines and all categories of retailers and wholesale packagers of the Caribbean’s tourism products.

His responsibility is to deliver the CTO’s mission as the Caribbean’s tourism development agency, providing specialized services and technical support to a variety of public and private sector members in the areas of marketing, human resource development, communication, research and statistics, information technology and sustainable tourism development.

About the Caribbean Tourism Organization

The Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO), with headquarters in Barbados and offices in New York and London, is the Caribbean’s tourism development agency comprising membership of the region’s finest countries and territories including Dutch, English, French and Spanish, as well as a myriad of private sector allied members. The CTO’s vision is to position the Caribbean as the most desirable, year round, warm weather destination, and its purpose is Leading Sustainable Tourism – One Sea, One Voice, One Caribbean.

Among the benefits to its members the organization provides specialized support and technical assistance in sustainable tourism development, marketing, communications, advocacy, human resource development, event planning & execution and research & information technology.

In addition the CTO, in partnership with the Caribbean Hotel & Tourism Association, jointly and equally owns the Caribbean Tourism Development Company, a marketing and business development entity dedicated to promoting the Caribbean brand worldwide.

Share this:

Like this:

5 thoughts on “About”

I am a graduate tourism student of the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill campus. It is a proven fact that tourism industry in the Caribbean is the #1 foreign exchange earner and it is also true that sporting events is a major tourism attraction e.g T20 cricket. My question is why is there so little focus on sports tourism?
Secondly, We all seem to be depending on the 4 s instead of each island identifying a niche product e.g culture and heritage which can be used as a pull agent. Each island is unique and combined can create a product that can be marketed as a whole or in parts.

Thank you for your comment! Within CTO’s member countries, there is a tremendous focus on sports tourism. Caribbean countries tend to focus on sports that appeal mostly to them. So for instance, the 2017 MSBC Caribbean Winter Baseball Championship in Puerto Rico (http://www.msblpuertorico.com/), the Popeyes Bahamas Bowl (http://www.bahamasbowl.com/), the Goat Races of Tobago (http://aimtvgroup.com/rawtravelblog/the-goat-races-of-tobago/) and Sol Rally Barbados (http://www.rallybarbados.bb/) are just a few examples of major sporting events that attract visitors to our Region. There are also sports figures with Caribbean roots who also become advocates for our member countries in which they call home. In terms of heritage, the Caribbean has 25 World Heritage Sites that we should be extremely proud of that also draws visitors to our Region.

Let me know if this answers your question, if you need further insight I will be happy to discuss in more detail.

Yes, I realize that there are a number of events that draw people to the various destinations but what I do not see evident is a conscious effort by Government or even the CTO to use Sports as a tool for increasing tourist,arrival. It is not only the organizing of the events which are mainly done by the sporting organizations with a little input from Government anyway but in all other areas including risk management, marketing etc.